Icebergs in the Ross Sea, Antarctica

  • Credit

    Jeff Schmaltz

While the B-15A iceberg remains stuck in the McMurdo Sound, blocking trapped sea ice from floating away to melt in the warmer summer waters of the Ross Sea, the B-15J iceberg is slowly moving toward the Ross Ice Shelf and Ross Island. This set of true-color Terra MODIS images shows the roundish iceberg slowly rotating counter-clockwise as it moves west. The smaller, oblong iceberg that B-15J is approaching is the C-16 iceberg. The long thin iceberg between C-16 and the gargantuan B-15A is B-15K; all of the B-15 icebergs spawned from the same calving in 2002. B-15A and its sister icebergs have been blocking up ice in McMurdo Sound since 2004, and until recently, B-15A was on a collision-course with the Drygalski Ice Tongue (pointing northeast from the Ross Ice Shelf). The top image is from February 25, 2005, while the rollover image is from February 14, 2005.

Metadata

  • Sensor

    Terra/MODIS

  • MODIS Bands

    1,4,3

  • Display Date

    January 5, 2005